


We find what we don't seek (but perhaps, what we need)

by twinSky



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Gen, bonding through similar emotionally (and physically!) traumatic expierences, fluff from a certain point of view, pre-KH3, yeah that's the tag. that's the fic.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-02
Updated: 2020-05-02
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:34:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23955418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twinSky/pseuds/twinSky
Summary: Aqua, Lea notes, spends a lot of time just staring off into the sky, as if she’s waiting for something (for someone) to just fall out from it. After the days said and done, she’ll sit on the edge of the world for hours upon hours just staring out into the setting sun, into the night sky and its shining stars.As if she’s waiting for something to come and make her world make sense again.Lea relates more than he’d like to, most days.
Relationships: Aqua & Axel (Kingdom Hearts), Aqua & Lea (Kingdom Hearts)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 26





	We find what we don't seek (but perhaps, what we need)

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this like. over a year ago for a free digital zine and then forgot to post it? So here it is. If you have read this before and for some reason remember it, I added a couple lines, and like a whole new scene and a half so read it again maybe?.
> 
> I just think Axel and Aqua are very similiar and should get to talk more (and also Sora. but this isn't about him). 
> 
> Written pre-kh3, this takes place somewhere after 2.8 but before kh3 would've started. (The Lea/Axel thing is. an effort)

Aqua, Lea notes, spends a lot of time just staring off into the sky, as if she’s waiting for something (for someone) to just fall out from it. After the days said and done, she’ll sit on the edge of the world for hours upon hours just staring out into the setting sun, into the night sky and its shining stars.

As if she’s waiting for something to come and make her world make sense again.

Lea relates more than he’d like to, most days.

-

Unsurprisingly, Riku and Mickey don’t explain much when they bring a quiet and exhausted looking Aqua back to Yensid’s tower. Mickey is enigmatic when he wants to be, and Riku’s annoying enough to believe that somethings are on a need to know basis, and none of them ever need to know. (Lea thinks that, by now maybe Riku should know better, but who is Lea to judge on keeping secrets.) They leave her leaned against the wall, listless, clothes torn, and all they say is that they found her, and that they saved her from the realm of darkness. Aqua is a former master; she’s here to help them finally end this war with her knowledge and guidance.

Kairi cheers, as do Donald and Goofy, and Sora eventually joins in after a moment of staring at her with an expression Lea’s come to equate to whenever Sora’s and Roxas’ feelings overlap too much, or Roxas’ push too strongly forward. It’s different though, a soft kind of wonder in his expression that Lea would never equate with Roxas, and Lea wonders.

Mostly, Lea thinks, looking at the way Aqua isn’t even really looking at them, or anything at all, is how they think this lost woman is going to be of any help to them –shouldn’t they be helping her first?

-

(He at the very least, has finally got most of his feelings in some proper order. Aqua, he thinks sometimes, is just going through the motions.)

-

Surprisingly, she is actually a great help to them.

Aqua’s a master, in a way that Riku still isn’t, still too young, and new, and rash (too terrified to take charge, but unwilling to let others bear the burden). And in a way Yensid is too old and wise and annoying to be (in Lea’s opinion anyway). She spends her first two days back resting, floating around the tower like a ghost, and then the next snaps to attention and begins teaching them with a patience that Lea doesn’t expect from someone who looks closer to his age then not.

Aqua is kind, she is patient, and she is understanding. Aqua is the picture perfect image of poise and perfection and Lea can’t tell if no one else but him has noticed how fake that all is, or if they’re all just willingly let her put up the front because surely she will fall apart without it.

He wonders which is worse, and then wonders why he cares.

-

He thinks it’s maybe because he sees part of himself in her. Here because he should be, here because there is no where else to go.

Here because maybe here, just maybe, he’ll find everything it is he’s lost.

(Everything that had made life worth fighting for.)

Lea does not know her whole story, but he’s heard bits and pieces in snatches from the others, what Aqua herself has let slip. He knows enough to understand that she’s searching too.

He knows enough to understand that she’s falling apart too, but faster, like a shooting star. So bright and beautiful to watch, but burning away at both ends, nevertheless.

-

“You watch her a lot,” Kairi says one day, voice teasing as she wags a finger at him, “got a crush?” she jokes.

“Nah,” he replies, “Not my type.” He continues, leaning in close to whisper it and Kairi laughs.

“Seriously though, you do, what’s up?” She continues, straightening up, suddenly serious with eyebrows furrowed in almost comical portrayal of importance.

Lea stays quiet, because he doesn’t know why, not entirely, not yet.

“I think you could help,” Kairi says abruptly, and he stares at her, bewildered, but she just smiles tiredly. Kairi he knows, is far better in tune with her emotions than the rest of them, can probably read their chaotic thoughts like a book even on an off day. It might be a Princess of Heart thing, but Lea thinks she’s just cool like that. “Master Aqua carries something dark and sad in her, I don’t know how to reach it, she hides it so well. But you, you do too. I think you can help her.”

He scoffs, “Oh really princess? And what about me, what if I need help?”

Kairi is silent, before turning to face him with that too knowing expression she gets sometimes, he refuses to look away –it feels like admitting defeat. “You can help each other.” And then after a pause, “And I can too, everyone. Neither of you are alone and I think you both still need to learn that.”

And Lea, he doesn’t know what to reply to that, so he doesn’t. They sit there, watching the sunset until the sky turns dark and he hates that he can’t help but think that somewhere he knows Aqua is doing the same.

But alone.

-

Lea lasts all of three days before Kairi’s words gets the better of him. He knows she’s right, has known he’s known that since the moment he laid eyes on Aqua. He just hadn’t wanted to admit it, because it was too much to bear.

Kairi spots him, huddled over the table in the kitchen, and laughs. His scowl does nothing to dissuade her laughter, only offering him a ‘good luck’ before grabbing a drink and leaving.

-

One day, Lea will learn to deal with issues without including ice cream. Maybe, it’s not like the ice cream is bad or anything, if anything it makes everything better. So scratch that, Lea thinks he might look into how the use of ice cream can improve all situations.

A piece of the popsicle drips onto his hand and he startles, gripping it harder.

Right.

He’s on a mission here; no distractions.

Aqua, as she always does by this time of day, sits at the edge feet swaying over it. He approaches her hesitantly and then settles next to her, offering the popsicle to her. She takes it with a raised brow, but otherwise does not speak. He expects her to say something, to tell him to leave, to ask him why he’s here, but she simply turns back to the sky and gives the popsicle a try.

She hums when she tastes it, a soft sad smile playing on her lips, and together they sit in silence.

-

They do this almost every day, sitting in silence as they eat their ice cream. Watching the sky blaze red before fading to black as stars begin to illuminate.

“Do you know why the sun sets red?” He asks one day, breaking their eternal silence.

“No,” Aqua replies after a moment, turning over her popsicle stick; the word ‘winner’ facing up at them, “going to tell me?”

He does, and then she tells him stories about the stars.

They start talking after that.

-

Aqua, he learns, is a fighter –in more ways than one. She shares her story slowly, in bits and pieces, and Lea does the same. If Lea has lost then Aqua has _lost_ and been stolen from, she fought and she lost and was left with nothing. Lea thought he was the same, but he’s learning that he has so much more, or more so that he’s finally found more. He wonders if Aqua has begun to notice the same thing.

There’s so much out there to live for, for fight for, if you just look, if you just try.

Sora taught Lea that, even if he didn’t mean to.

He wants to do the same for her, even if he doesn’t know how. Because people helped him, and he thinks he can finally pay that forward.

-

“Thank you,” Aqua says one day out of the blue as Lea stands up, dusting off his clothes to turn in for the night.

“For what,” He asks one eyebrow raised as he removes the popsicle stick from his mouth. “I haven’t really done anything if you haven’t notice. Well, aside from buying you ice cream.”

Aqua laughs, looking up at him with a smile. “Sometimes nothing is enough, sometimes just company is enough.” She pauses, expression turning into something wistful, smile still present as her hand falls to the wayfinder that never leaves her side. “Sometimes, just a friend who understands is worth more than anything else in the world.”

Lea thinks of all those days on the clock tower talking about nothing, Lea thinks of laying down in the grass with Kairi after a rough session of training, of Sora sneaking him out to see something cool in another world and both of them laughing when they return and get scolded.

Lea thinks of this right here, sitting side by side in silence.

“I guess it is.” He finally says, and notices he’s smiling now too.

-

“Thank you,” Lea hears, and blinks through his déjà vu, wondering what he’s done now.

He turns to see Sora, but his expression is off, not quite smiling like he isn’t sure how the expression works on his face.

“Sora?” He asks unsure, hand reaching out to steady him as he begins to sway.

“Thank you.” He says again, firmer, and Lea notices his eyes are wrong. The blue is brighter, flashing and catching like waves in the wind. It’s not right but…

“Roxas?” And Sora frowns, like the name is all confusing and off putting, before his expression clears and his dim to their usual sky blue.

“No, Sora.” Sora replies, grinning, “Come on Lea you can’t get mad at me for getting your name wrong if you can’t get it straight either.”

Lea snorts, taking the hand he was using to steady Sora to push him back instead. “My one slip up is nothing compared to you mountain of mistakes.”

“Whatever!” Sora says, then looks around like he just realised where he is. “Oh! Kairi asked me to come get you, I was looking for you when…” he pauses, brow furrowing before he shakes his head. “Well I found you, so let’s go.”

“Lead the way squirt,” he offers graciously with a ruffle of his hair, grinning when Sora squawks swatting it away, “by the way; you’re welcome.”

Sora’s expression flickers for a moment, eyes flashing, before settling as he sticks out his tongue. “For what! You should be thanking _me_ before Kairi found you all upset because she thought you were avoiding her.”

Lea thinks he might understand what’s going on here, but not enough to be confident about it.

Not enough to say anything.

-

Aqua had told him about her two companions, of what became of them. Or what she thought at least, she couldn’t be sure, especially after so much time in the dark.

Something about it strikes Lea as familiar, but not enough to be able to put his finger on it.

Somehow he knows though, that this isn’t up to him, or up to her.

(Sora’s always been the connecting piece after all.)

-

Aqua, Lea notes absently one day, still occasionally just stares up at the sky.

Not for as long, and nowhere near as lonely, but she still does it. Though at least where before her gaze seemed aimless, waiting for something she didn’t know was out there but so desperately wanted to believe would come back anyways, now it is firm –powerful, forceful.

Aqua stares up at the sky and dares it not to give her back what she’s lost, what was taken from her. Dares the worlds to dream she won’t tear them all apart to get it back.

Lea feels the same; they’ve all lost too much to a crazy old man who thinks he knows what he’s doing. And together, they’re going to get it all back, once and for all.

**Author's Note:**

> lea should be glad photos didn't exist in bbs because seeing a pic of ven would fuck him up because he'd one) remember ven existed and two) remember he looks identical to roxas. Wild As Shit. Lea just wanted Isa back how did this happen to him.
> 
> Anyways, thanks for reading!
> 
> [Tumblr](http://twinsky.tumblr.com)/[Twitter](https://twitter.com/twinsky72)


End file.
